Organisations will work together to counter the threat to the banking industry

BAE Systems Applied Intelligence is announcing today that is has become an associate member of the British Bankers’ Association (BBA), as part of a broader working partnership in which the two organisations will work together to counter the growing threat to the UK banking and financial services industry from cyber-enabled financial crime.

The BBA is the UK’s leading association for the banking sector, representing the interests of more than 240 member organisations. The organisation’s focus on raising business practice standards across the banking sector places it in a strong position to highlight the scale and prevalence of the evolving cyber threat to banks of all sizes.

As part of the new working relationship, BAE Systems Applied Intelligence was an associate sponsor of the BBA’s inaugural Cyber Security Summit, which took place yesterday. The Summit raised awareness of global industry challenges resulting from the convergence of sophisticated cyber attacks and traditional forms of financial crime, such as fraud and money laundering. At the Summit a panel discussion around the use of preventative systems and controls to address these evolving threats took place. Speakers on the panel included Don Randall, Chief Information Security Officer for the Bank of England, James Hatch, Director of Cyber Services for BAE Systems Applied Intelligence and Angus Burden, MD Information Risk Management for JPMorgan Chase.

Anthony Browne, Chief Executive of the BBA, said;

“Millions of peoples’ lives have already been hit by cyber-crime and the threat will only grow as the internet brings us closer together. That’s why our partnership with leading technology solution providers such as BAE Systems will be so useful as we look to turn the heat up on cyber criminals by sharing ideas on how to develop more efficient and effective services.

“I look forward to working with Martin and the rest of his team throughout 2014 and beyond on a series of business critical events, reports and briefings on the global challenge facing our industry.”

“We are very pleased to be joining the BBA and have no doubt that we can form a highly effective and important partnership that will help banks across the UK to better understand the threat they face and how to address this challenge in order to protect themselves and their customers as effectively as possible.

“In recent weeks, we have seen a series of high profile attacks that have highlighted just how prevalent and pervasive the cyber threat really is. What we are now seeing is a new era of digital criminality in which highly organised criminal groups are taking these cyber techniques a stage further and using them to carry out fraud and other financial crimes on an unprecedented scale. The ability to steal vast quantities of personal data, access critical networks and attack multiple targets simultaneously provides these organisations with a wealth of opportunities to exploit, and if successful the damage they can cause is enormous.

“The UK banking industry, which represents the largest cluster of international banks anywhere, is an obvious target for these groups – both because of the potential financial reward from a successful attack and also because of the sector’s vital strategic importance to the UK economy – essentially leaving it in the eye of a perfect storm. The industry has to be applauded for the steps it has taken to date to meet this challenge and I am confident that our partnership with the BBA will help it to continue to do so, providing a platform to share best practice and intelligence and to continue to respond to an ever evolving threat.”

At BAE Systems, we serve the needs of our customers by delivering a wide range of advanced defence, aerospace and security solutions that provide a performance edge. We work together with local partners to develop, engineer, manufacture and support the innovations that increase defence sovereignty, sustain economies and safeguard commercial interests. With some 84,600 employees in six continents, we are committed to creating solutions that protect and strengthen nations, commerce, communities and people.

BAE Systems Applied Intelligence is a business division of BAE Systems that delivers solutions that help clients to protect and enhance their critical assets in the intelligence age. Our intelligent protection solutions combine large-scale data exploitation, ‘intelligence-grade’ security and complex services and solutions integration. We operate in four key domains of expertise: cyber security, financial crime, communications intelligence and digital transformation.